JRC Radar user experience

[Woodpile]

I'm thinking of buying a JRC 1000 radar and I'd appreciate feedback from anyone else who has installed or used one. I expect to be using it for occasional night passages (channel crossings/along the south coast) and if I'm accidentally out and about in bad vis. I'm not experienced with radar and I'm not a gadget freak - so will the JRC 1000 fit the bill or should I save up for a more expensive version with extra functions? (Max boat speed is around 8 knots.)

Thanks in advance for any advice,
Chris

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[graham]

You dont need all the gadgets.The most basic set will show the position of buoys and more importantly ships.

You could probably benefit from doing a course first.The JRC manuals are good but take a lot of studying. The course teaches you the basics of tuning it in adjusting the controls for different weather and sea conditions, interpreting the picture and knowing if other vessels are on a collision course or not.

I am certain you will get replies from gadget freaks saying that interfacing with gps is vital along with a pile of other facilities.I use Radar every day in my job and think the best option is a high quality set as large as will fit on your boat /budget but not neccesarilly with all the bells and whistles.

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[ArthurWood]

JRC 1000 is a good product. They have recently announced a MkII version of the 1000 you might want to look at.

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[Birdseye]

have one of the original jrc 1000 - proved quite good once i found out how to tune it. practical use is in exactly the circs you describe. some of the gadget parts (eg trails, guard ranges) are not a lot of use imho, but yes it is definitely worth connecting to the gps since this allows the radar to give you a compass bearing of an approaching vessel for collision avoidance.

surprisingly good at very short range, entering and unlit harbour at night and looking for moored dinghies etc.

cant think of anything of practical use that would be provided by a more expensive set (no doubt someone will mention something i havent thought of) so save the difference and buy an epirb if you havent got one.

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[Birdseye]

Two tips:
if you can find any way of doing so, mount the display where you can see it when helming - they are far less use down below in the cabin

if you balk at cutting a large enough hole in the deck to take the cable plug, jrc told me it was ok to cut the cable and join with choclate block fittings in a waterproof case. fiddly but does work

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[LadyInBed]

I echo what 'Birdseye' has said, I have been very happy with mine.
One of its more usefull gimics for me is 'Echo Enhancement' which makes small blips easier to spot.

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[brianhumber]

Have a JRC and find it very good, easy to operate and understand. Use it for foggy cross channels - also makes harbour approaches a doddle. No need to fit scanner high up the mast, fitted mine at about 3 meters from a single ladder span roped to mast as you need a good stable base to attach scanner supports and wire in the scanner. You still pick up landfalls as well as the chaps who fit scanners at the top of their masts.

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[StephenW]

I was considering the same last year, read up about radar and ended up paying a bit more for the JRC 1500. It has an 18" rather than 12" radome giving a 5.2 degree rather than 7 degree angle i.e. more detailed picture and the same as Raytheon etc without massively increased cost.

Street price for a 1500 is about £1000 and its proved to be a good unit. Interfacing with the Garmin 128 is straightforward but you'll find it only displays the "next" waypoint.

If you need to cut the cable make sure you use clamp-type chocolate box connectors and leave plenty of cable (the 1500 includes longer cable than the 1000). They are a bit more expensive but don't progressively chew up your cable every time they are tightened then loosened during mast removal. Silicone grease on the contacts will make them much more reliable and les prone to corrosion.

Marconi marine are now the distributor for JRC and I have found them helpful.

Someone mentioned about the visibility from the cockpit and I agree with this. We have a Sadler 32 and I got over the problem by making a small ledge shelf onto which the radar display fits and can then swivel towards the cockpit/helm. It sits high on the back of the nav table . Works well.

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[duncan]

shame the MkII display is now out and the deals on the 1000 original have disappeared...........had finally found the 650 to get one and this thread had confirmed enough!
Oh well............

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[StephenW]

Don't forget you're also likely to need a scanstrut radar bracket for attachment of the radome to the mast. This is heavu duty aluminium, takes a lot of strain when the sail is backed and normally has a safety cable to retain the radome in the event of te strut being dislodged by very strong forces.

The scanstrut can cost over £100 so strongly recommend working a deal with the distributor you buy the radar from and getting both together.You may get the strut thrown in free or at minimal cost.

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[duncan]

thnks for this but I will be mounting the dome straight onto the cabin roof of my little fishing boat - also one of the reasons the smaller radome appeals as it will fit nicely amongst the various ariels.
I will have to modify my running light (all round white) to show above the radome though.

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[StephenW]

Ah yes, they are very compact. The controls (common to both 1000 and 1500) are also very intuitive.

Remember when you are mounting it to keep the radome well above you/your line of vision. Radar emits microwaves (like the cookers) which are particularlyeffetive at cooking water based things, like bodies and particularly eyes....

I use the term "cooking" loosely, but it won't do you any good and can do some harm - so keep up high above head height with some clearance.

Good luck

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[duncan]

hmmm - it will be a whole 6 inches directly above my head with a couple of thin layers of GRP between us; help!

Seriously there must be guidance notes for any danger they pose somewhere?

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[StephenW]

As they say, its your head...!

More positively, I think you need to consider how it works, which is to send out a beam that will angle out from the radome and rotate 360 degrees. The vertical (up and down from horizontal) angle I'm not sure about, but maybe 30 degrees andgle to the horizontal wouldn't surprise me as I can pick up fairly near objects with the radome up at say 6-7m hich .

You might try Marine Electronic Services (advertise in PBO and Yachting monthly) who both sell and offer installation.

Up to you but I'd go for some sort of small pole with a flat plate on top and bottom for mounting to take it higher and remove the concern

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[Guest]

25 degree vertical beam width on the JRC, from memory. But if you read the spec, although it's a 2kW radar output, the unit only burns about 45W continuous, so even if you ran round in circles on the roof with your head in front of the thing, you still wouldn't get a lot of microwave radiation. But the higher the thing is, the better it can 'see'...

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[chriswilliams29]

we have just fitted a JRC 1000 to ourARVOR25 which i fitted mainly for foggy conditions and like yourself safety passages.
it is a smashing little unit easy to fit and use.
we purchased the unit for £675 from the chandlers in burnham on crouch Mailspeed

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[graham]

In normal scanning mode it wont do you any harm but if the scanner stops rotating for some reason the concentration of rays can damage eyes/skin etc.Theres info about it on the HSE website.

Try a search engine on HSE safety of Radar in Ports or something along those lines.

Putting it on a short mast will improve its capability anyway.

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[tjc]

Fitted a JRc 1000 at the beginningof the season. Takes a bit of time to tune, the manual is a bit confusing if you are not a "techie". once tuned it is really quite good especially at short ranges. IMHO you do not really need the longer ranges on a sailing boat - three miles is probably enough.

Used it once in anger, 40 miles in thick fog along the coast and without it I would have been in a bit of trouble as sailing singlehanded at the time. When you get used to what it does and spend some time using "gain" properly it is excellent.

I can see mine from the helm and I think that this is important as you will become very reliant on it in bad conditions and watch it continually when there is shipping close by.

It even picked up a lobster pot marker on dark calm evening!!

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[duncan]

similar boat to mine - did you stick it on a mini mast as others are suggesting or plonk it straight on the cabin roof as I plan (had planned)?

Ah well it seems achademic 'cos I can't find any of the Mk1 deals left and 830 odd for the mkII seems so much more!

<hr width=100% size=1><P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by duncan on 22/07/2003 23:15 (server time).</FONT></P>

 

[Woodpile]

Thanks everyone - I've gone ahead and bought a MK1 JRC 1000 based on these positive comments. Sadly, I missed all the £650 deals, but Seamark Nunn still had one of the old models at £750 - in case anyone is interested!

Thanks again,
Chris

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